Eyes in the Back of Your Head: Observing Student Actions
In Mr. Scotts classroom at Cole, students are grouped heterogeneously at various tables around the classroom. During class, students typically work in groups but in lecture they are expected to pay attention and individually participate in class discussions. Today’s class, students worked in groups completing a post activity assignment that was designed to reflect their understandings of a previous activity. As the students entered Mr. Scott's room, they all went to their desks, put their books and materials aside, and took out their activity sheets from the other day. This initial routine is regular in this classroom, students have a standard entrance routine. After sitting down Mr. Scott began an opening exercise to get the students thinking about the previous activity. During his lectures he utilizes the entire classroom space and walks around. This use of proximity control helps reduce the amount of side conversations and brings the discussion around to all of the students. I noticed that by walking around, more students are prompted to respond to his questions and are active in the discussions. When the students moved into groups to complete their post lab activity Mr. Scott would walk around the room and make sure that they were on task and ask any questions. Most of the time students were engaged in the lesson and on task but in a few instances they began to get chatty and off task. In these cases, Mr. Scott or I would walk over to the group and ask them to get on task or ask them a facilitating question.
During classwork or discussions, Mr. Scott lets small misbehaviors slide. He says that you can't expect to have a class of 6th graders sit forward with their hands together for 80 minutes and that is true. During the group work activities in today's class students were having side conversations but still getting the work done. This is a good example of letting the small (minor) misbehaviors slide. When the talking got too loud or certain behaviors became too excessive, proximity control was all that was need to correct the behavior. Student engagement is very important to how I will teach. I prefer student-centered instruction and without student participation it does not work well. To entice my students to participate I may offer some sort of credit/merit for participation. I will also utilize active lessons such as labs or going outside to support engagement. By utilizing the entire space of the classroom during my instruction I can bring the whole class to the front of the room. This will help avoid the lack of classroom management that can typically happen in the back of the classroom.
Journal #2
Eyes in the Back of Your Head: Observing Student Actions
In Mr. Scotts classroom at Cole, students are grouped heterogeneously at various tables around the classroom. During class, students typically work in groups but in lecture they are expected to pay attention and individually participate in class discussions.
Today’s class, students worked in groups completing a post activity assignment that was designed to reflect their understandings of a previous activity. As the students entered Mr. Scott's room, they all went to their desks, put their books and materials aside, and took out their activity sheets from the other day. This initial routine is regular in this classroom, students have a standard entrance routine. After sitting down Mr. Scott began an opening exercise to get the students thinking about the previous activity. During his lectures he utilizes the entire classroom space and walks around. This use of proximity control helps reduce the amount of side conversations and brings the discussion around to all of the students. I noticed that by walking around, more students are prompted to respond to his questions and are active in the discussions. When the students moved into groups to complete their post lab activity Mr. Scott would walk around the room and make sure that they were on task and ask any questions. Most of the time students were engaged in the lesson and on task but in a few instances they began to get chatty and off task. In these cases, Mr. Scott or I would walk over to the group and ask them to get on task or ask them a facilitating question.
During classwork or discussions, Mr. Scott lets small misbehaviors slide. He says that you can't expect to have a class of 6th graders sit forward with their hands together for 80 minutes and that is true. During the group work activities in today's class students were having side conversations but still getting the work done. This is a good example of letting the small (minor) misbehaviors slide. When the talking got too loud or certain behaviors became too excessive, proximity control was all that was need to correct the behavior.
Student engagement is very important to how I will teach. I prefer student-centered instruction and without student participation it does not work well. To entice my students to participate I may offer some sort of credit/merit for participation. I will also utilize active lessons such as labs or going outside to support engagement. By utilizing the entire space of the classroom during my instruction I can bring the whole class to the front of the room. This will help avoid the lack of classroom management that can typically happen in the back of the classroom.